Moments in Time: Jim Gordon
by Stargazer Nataku
Summary: Moments of Commissioner Gordon's life, compressed into twelve ficlets of 100 words each. Begins with his coming to Gotham, and ends after the events of The Dark Knight.


_**Moments in Time: Jim Gordon**_

_**By **_

_**Stargazer Nataku**_

_**One**_

Gotham City is nothing like Jim Gordon expected when his superiors had informed him of the transfer. Driving down dark, narrow streets, he tries to ignore the dirt and grime coating the buildings like a second skin, litter blowing down streets sunshine doesn't penetrate. Next to him, Barbara is silent, studying the scenery as intently as he. "Nothing like Chicago," he comments.

"No," Barbara agrees. "But a second chance is better than none, Jim." She turns and manages a smile. "We'll make it home, you'll see. We'll be happy."

He smiles, but it doesn't reach his eyes. "We will, Barbara."

_**Two**_

Jim Gordon watches the child sitting in the office, clutching his father's coat. The look on his face is heartbreaking and haunted and he has to try to ease the pain there. Kneeling before the boy, speaking calmly, Gordon takes the coat and wraps it carefully around his shoulders. "There you go," he says, giving it a final tug, hand going to young Bruce Wayne's face. "It's okay," he says. "It's okay." Bruce meets his eyes, holds them for a moment and Gordon struggles to find something else to say.

They—Bruce Wayne and Jim Gordon both—know Gordon's lying.

_**Three**_

When news of Bruce Wayne's disappearance reaches him, Gordon feels pity for the troubled young man, remembers the boy he tried to comfort in the Captain's office years earlier. Part of him hopes he'll reappear, but a decade in Gotham has taught Gordon well. He's a realist, has to be, and despite the lack of a body or any other evidence, Gordon knows that Wayne is dead. He wishes the truth were different, but there's no other realistic possibility. The only real question is how and why he died. People who disappear on the streets of Gotham don't come back.

_**Four**_

Jim Gordon's waits in the hospital waiting room for fifteen hours and forty-two minutes. He knows how many tiles there are in the ceiling. He's read every outdated magazine. He tries not to worry about his wife and their coming child. When the waiting is over and he's allowed to hold their son, he feels only wonder over the fragility of the life in his arms. Sitting in the dark hospital room, he holds his son and promises he'll keep him safe. Knows he'll do anything to protect him from Gotham. Knows for certain he'll die himself if he fails.

_**Five**_

Gordon's at his desk when the light goes out. There's a click that sounds like a gun cocking and pressure against his neck. He freezes, trembling, and listens to the rasping voice. He answers the questions honestly before he finds the courage to ask his own. The answer to his second question and the man's disappearance brings him to his feet. But on the roof, he freezes, unable to shoot. He doesn't know why, doesn't understand then the meaning of the masked man's words. What he does know is that staplers can sound incredibly like the release on a handgun.

_**Six**_

When Jim Gordon meets the adult Bruce Wayne it's at a fundraiser for the Gotham PD. The party goes on around them, glasses clinking, soft women's laughter, the occasional snap of a photograph being taken. There are hints of a grieving child in the playboy's eyes, his famous smile faded. After a long moment, Bruce extends his hand. Gordon shakes it, barely hearing the words Wayne speaks as the clasp comes undone. "Thank you." All Gordon can do is nod before Wayne slips away. Within minutes, Wayne's laugh is echoing towards Gordon where he stands apart. It doesn't sound real.

_**Seven**_

Called to the docks, Gordon doesn't see Batman, he sees his aftermath. He admits--silently as he can't say it aloud, instinct tells him that—he's impressed. He'd been sure it would be more of the same when called to the scene. Low level guys arrested and put away for a few years, leaving the structure intact. Years of pessimism from a career in the Gotham PD ensures he knows that. Then he's directed to the searchlight, casting a vague shadow into the starless sky above Gotham. He didn't think he could be surprised by anything anymore. He was wrong.

_**Eight**_

He's taking out the garbage the first time he really sees Batman, sirens blaring in the distance. The gravelly voice has him closing the door, beyond which his wife and son are sitting at the table. It's a protective movement, one that would do nothing should the man in the cowl wish to harm, but it makes Gordon feel better. He tells the man what he wants to know, mentions the task force and is honest when he says he doesn't think the masked vigilante is dangerous. His next words, possibly unheard, are not lies either. He's been wrong before.

_**Nine**_

When Gotham is safe from Ra's al Ghul, Gordon looks back on the incident with something akin to amusement. He's experienced many things with the Gotham PD, from comical incidents to memories that wake him in a cold sweat to strange ones that leave him questioning the sanity of the universe. Batman fits in the last category, mostly. Then again, what can you say about a man who trusts in Batman's madness? Some days he wonders if it's not the universe that's mad, but himself. He doesn't have an answer to that. He isn't at all sure he wants one.

_**Ten**_

As Gordon eulogizes the man who nearly killed his son, he willfully forgets Rachel Dawes and his failure which allowed the Joker to push Harvey into madness. He forgets the suffering he's brought to Batman and his family. He cannot bring himself to lie so he tells half-truths, blames the Joker for Dent's death, and tries not to cry out Batman's innocence to a city unready for such revelations. He instead grits his teeth and speaks of the lost possibilities, of what Dent could have done as Gotham's White Knight. Gordon stays strong, knowing that the war has scarcely begun.

_**Eleven**_

Jim Gordon doesn't blame his wife for leaving, for taking their children with her. He saw it coming for a long time, and in the end he didn't fight it. Dent's madness taught him that his family could never be safe so long as they stay in Gotham, and he loves them too much for that. Sitting in his dark, empty living room, he remembers the promises he made to Jimmy the night Jimmy was born, and knows he made the right decision. If the price for their safety is his own loneliness, it's a small enough price to pay.

_**Twelve**_

Glass from the shattered Batsignal crunches under Gordon's feet as he moves to the roof's edge to stare across Gotham's glowing skyline. Batman never comes here now, it's too dangerous, but Gordon sometimes needs to remind himself that Gotham can be beautiful. The skyline shines golden in the night, a shrine to man's greatness and imagination, creating below the dark dirty caverns of streets which are temples to man's evil. Heaven hiding hell, Gotham is not what she appears. Just like Batman. But that is a secret Jim has kept well, because it isn't his. It belongs to his partner.

Author's Note: Thanks for reading my second installment in the "Moments in Time" series! Again, the point of these challenges are to write stories that express a character or a plot within exactly 100 words, no more, no less. It's good practice in word choice, and it's difficult. There are two or three I'm not entirely pleased with, but I am not sure how to improve them and I think they're fine as they stand. Please let me know what you think if you have the time. I love reviews; they make me exceedingly happy. For those of you who have reviewed or favorite my works, it's greatly appreciated!


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